Phoenix Element: Normality Twisted

by Jennifer Kibble

Phoenix Element is a book series that mixes magic, fantasy and super heroes into a pot and spans several different planets and lifetimes. Jennibelle starts her day just the same as any teenager, with trying to sleep in and avoid her everyday world. Thankfully it's the last day before Spring Break, however a new student, Kyle Roberts, appears on the same day that random portals begin opening up. Faced with robots, Kyle has no other choice than to take Jennibelle and her seven year old babysitting charge, Miles, to another planet. This is only the beginning of Jennibelle's adventure, as she discovers she's a reincarnated princess named Anya. To keep both realities separate, Jennibelle takes the name of Anya as Kyle teaches her to use her magical powers of fire. As Anya learns how to control her powers, more issues surface. Anya begins to hear a voice, one with evil intentions. Anya begins to battle her own sanity as the voice tries to take over. This voice, a Rayasha, has attached itself to Anya's soul and is waiting for the right moment to surface. Anya is not alone as others with magical powers start to surface and friends from her past stand at her side.

ebook

First published December 5, 2013

About the author

Jennifer is a geek at heart. She has used this love for video games, reading, the fantasy & science fiction world, and used it to help fuel her passion for writing. Her career as a writer turned serious after a trip to witness the final launch of the space shuttle Discovery. This set into motion the mind set to do what she loves. In her free time, Jennifer enjoys playing video games, reading, playing D&D, and listening to music.

Reviews

[Annette · Rating 3 out of 5]

Full disclosure: I received a copy of this from the author. I don't remember if I won a Goodreads contest or if she sent it because I offered to put her handouts on the author tables at DragonCon. Either way, I "Internet" know Jen and she in no way has influenced this review.

Coming of age/Awakening books have long been a part of young adult and sci-fi fantasy literature. Jen's done a fantastic job of creating a heroine you can believe is a real teenager struggling to come to terms with a world beyond Earth and some rather unnatural powers. She's got a great balance of action sequences to down time/discovery.

However, I struggled to get through the book because of the first person present voice, and some poor (or lack?) of editing. I don't blame the author for this. If she did have an editor, they didn't do a great job in helping her cut down on some of the redundancies and the proper rewriting that would have made the book shine brighter. Punctuation and formatting also needed work.

That said, I am looking forward to the second installment, Mages of Vane, and am interested in finding out where JB/Anya's story goes.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

I feel slightly bad giving it a 4 star review but let me explain.

First off it is an enjoyable young adult book. It has a little bit of every thing in it from robots and space travel to mages and teleportation.

It is it's own book by all means, it might feel like one thing and turn into another but in the end the author was able to make her own world, or worlds.

It has plenty of action and stuff I would love to see turned into film or television, the idea of seeing the "missed the movie" scene towards the end of the book or even the very end on screen would be amazing.


My biggest issue is the formatting or the chapters and I feel as if the proof readers didn't show up to work, which really does hurt a world you are trying to dive into.


Also toward the end a big part of the story is finally told and not that it was a surprise by any means it still don't want to spoil it for you, but I feel like this part of the book did become a bit harder to follow.

Either way I enjoyed it and look forward to seeing what Jenn can do in the next book!

[Chris Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Phoenix Element Normality Twisted is a great young adult novel. You can't stuff this book into one category on the bookshelf. It has something for everyone Action/Adventure, Sci-Fi, Fantasy, and comic book action. I have read a library of books over my lifetime. Most of them have male protagonists. The ones with female protagonist's generally do not feel real. The author has created a main created who feels real and girls can look up to as a role model. Just because the main character is female does not mean this book is not for men. There is plenty of action and story for everyone. Because we all know our current youth has a short attention span this book is a perfect size to get your young adult into more reading and it might even get them to take a break from video games or T.V. A must read new novel for the current generation.

[Cristina Isabel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jennibelle finds her world turned upside down when out of nowhere robots start appearing through portals. At the same time, a boy named Kyle Roberts, comes into the picture but he doesn't have time to explain, so, he takes Jennibelle and the 7 year old kid she's babysitting, Miles, to another planet. This adventure takes her on wild ride as she learns that in reality she is really a reincarnated princess named Anya. Jennibelle embraces the name of "Anya" as Kyle Roberts teaches her how to use her magical power, fire. But, they are far from danger as Anya begins to hear an evil voice. Anya has a lot of obstacles she will have to face, including this evil voice, but she is not alone as she meets up with friends from the past with magical abilities here to help.